A ministry of HCJB World Radio

Today’s News Headlines:

AZERBAIJAN POLICE USE ‘KGB METHODS’ TO RAID SUNDAY SCHOOL SRI LANKA EVANGELICALS CONCERNED ABOUT POSSIBLE EXCLUSION CHINESE POLICE RELEASE LAST OF 6 JAILED HOUSE CHURCH LEADERS PRO-FAMILY GROUPS IN U.S. UNITE TO DEFEND SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE LATIN AMERICA BECOMING MISSION FORCE TO ISLAMIC WORLD * CRISIS IN LIBERIA OPENS UP WITNESSING OPPORTUNITIES FOR ELWA

Today’s News Stories:

AZERBAIJAN POLICE USE ‘KGB METHODS’ TO RAID SUNDAY SCHOOL Protestant Christians in Azerbaijan are fearing for the future of their children after police raided a Sunday school using old Soviet-style “KGB methods,” reported Forum 18 News Service. Pastor Fuad Tariverdi of Greater Grace Protestant Church in the capital city of Baku said that Police Chief Mukhtar Mukhtarov broke up the class of about 50 children on Sunday, Aug. 31, saying that the church “has no right to teach kids.” Mukhtarov rejected any criticism and blamed the church. “They’re acting illegally,” he said. “There was nothing bad [going on], but this must be done with the permission of the Committee for Work with Religious Organizations.” Tariverdi said authorities have threatened to imprison him if he continues to hold Sunday school classes. He added that Mukhtarov has been “persecuting our church for years. He always sends people to invite our leadership to talk to him and tries to prove to us that we are wrong, bad, illegal and tries to intimidate us using Soviet/KGB ways and mentality.” This latest incident comes amid concern among human rights workers about an apparent crackdown in the former Soviet Union against Christian groups. Forum 18 News, which is linked to a human rights organization investigating religious persecution, said Azerbaijani officials “at all levels have obstructed the work of many minority religious communities, especially Protestant churches which have many ethnic Azeris as members.”(Assist News Service)

SRI LANKA EVANGELICALS CONCERNED ABOUT POSSIBLE EXCLUSION The National Christian Evangelical Alliance of Sri Lanka (EASL) is asking for assistance to ensure that the government of Sri Lanka officially recognizes evangelical churches. The Christian Affairs Ministry of Sri Lanka has recently announced that it will be compiling a list of “recognized” churches, but it appears that only the Roman Catholic Church and mainline Protestant denominations will be included on the list. Evangelicals make up less than 1 percent of the population, numbering around 120,000. There has been consistent pressure, particularly from Buddhist groups, against the evangelicals. The EASL is concerned that, if evangelical churches are left off the official list, it may amount to being outlawed. (Voice of the Martyrs)

CHINESE POLICE RELEASE LAST OF 6 JAILED HOUSE CHURCH LEADERS Three Chinese house church leaders who had been incarcerated since July 13 were released after international pressure mounted due to publicity of their case. The three others were released earlier in August. Qi Xian-Fa was released from the Kai Yuan Cheng Shi Hotel on Aug. 18 and Gao Chong-Dao on Aug. 25. Shen Shao-Cheng, 80, one of the church’s founders, was the last of the leaders released on Aug. 27. They were handed to village officials from their home area and returned to their families. The three were part of a group of six house Christians arrested in Xiao Shan City in Zhejiang province during an early-morning house church service on Sunday, July 13. For five days they were subjected to repeated interrogation and so-called “political study.” On the sixth day they were put into separate hotel rooms, and each was assigned two officials from the Religious Affairs Bureau and Public Security Bureau who were with them 24 hours a day. Each day there was more interrogation as authorities pressured the men to bring their church under state control. Officers told the men they would be rearrested if their congregations did not register with the Religious Affairs Bureau. (Voice of the Martyrs)

PRO-FAMILY GROUPS IN U.S. UNITE TO DEFEND SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE As indications grow that same-sex marriage will soon be legal in one or more states in the U.S., pro-family groups are uniting in a drive to defend the sanctity of marriage. The Massachusetts State Supreme Court is soon expected to legalize homosexual marriage, and the resulting legal struggle across the nation may doom traditional marriage. A coalition of almost 20 organizations — including such groups as Focus on the Family, the American Family Association, Prison Fellowship, INSP Broadcasting and the Home School Legal Defense Association — is preparing to kick off a new campaign with “Marriage Protection Week” Oct. 12-18. Don Wildmon, president and founder of the American Family Association, says the observance is an “opportunity to defend and promote traditional marriage between a man and a woman as the God-ordained building block of the family and bedrock of a civil society.” The purpose of the effort is to encourage churches to become involved in the battle to preserve traditional marriage. For details visit marriageprotectionweek.com. (Agape Press/Religion Today)

LATIN AMERICA BECOMING MISSION FORCE TO ISLAMIC WORLD Latin American Christians say reaching the Islamic world with the gospel is a top priority for them. Because of that CAM International is doing all it can to help facilitate that urgency. CAM’s Keegan Williamson says Central America, once a mission field, has become a mission force to the Muslim world. “They can go in with a very, very low profile, and most of them know what it’s like to be raised in a country that has a single dominant religion and to have a very limited religious liberties. Culturally, Latin Americans are also very similar in physical appearance.” CAM is specifically looking into expanding Muslim outreach into Albania. (Mission Network News)

* CRISIS IN LIBERIA OPENS UP WITNESSING OPPORTUNITIES FOR ELWA With up to 2,200 refuges crowded onto the campus of Radio Station ELWA in Monrovia, Liberia, to escape fighting with rebels in recent weeks, opportunities to share the gospel abound, said Rick Sacra, SIM Liberia’s associate director. He made the comments after a recent two-week visit to the station. Leaders at ELWA, a station operated by Liberian Christians in partnership with SIM and HCJB World Radio, have been holding nightly devotions and evangelism in the public areas for the displaced people. They also formed a health committee to deal with issues of sanitation and hygiene.

“As conditions improve, people are beginning to return home,” Sacra said. “The number of people on the campus is dropping daily. We thank God for the opportunity ELWA had to give these folks a safe place to stay, and share with them a little of God’s Word. General Manager James Kesselly also organized daily morning chapel times attended by all the staff, and noontime prayer meetings for the institution heads.”

Throughout the crisis, ELWA has remained on the air with FM broadcasts going out nearly daily, but on a limited schedule, depending on the availability of diesel fuel to operate the generators. “Due to the high price of diesel fuel [costing up to US$18 per gallon at the peak of the crisis], the hours were reduced. But only one day passed without a morning or evening broadcast,” Sacra said.

“The weekend of Aug. 9, ELWA was the only station on the air in Monrovia and carried all the official announcements concerning the turning-over ceremony held on Aug. 11,” he said. “The radio’s critical ministry gives people something positive to listen to, encouraging believers to stand firm in their faith, and giving non-Christians the message of hope in Jesus.”

SIM founded the station in 1954 to air the gospel across the country and West Africa. ELWA was destroyed twice by civil war, first in 1990 and again in 1996. The station went back on the air in 1997 with a small FM transmitter. Then in 2000 HCJB World Radio provided a low-power shortwave transmitter, again enabling the station to cover the region.

“Unfortunately, the shortwave transmitter is temporarily off the air,” Sacra said. Spare parts from the HCJB World Radio Engineering Center in Elkhart, Ind., were expected to arrive on Tuesday, Sept. 2.

The ELWA Hospital has also remained open, even during the worst fighting, providing care to the injured and needy, especially those with AIDS, Sacra said. “At the height of the crisis, few patients were coming to the hospital for care, but as things improved, the number of patients increased,” he said. “Pediatrics was full much of the time. . . . Obstetrics was also moderately busy. Thank God for our two faithful local doctors along with two interns. The staff has also been faithful and flexible through the crisis time.”

In response to a pledge of funds from a U.S.-based charity, ELWA and SIM-related churches have launched a short-term children’s feeding programs. But with rice costing up to US$2 per cup, food has been scarce. A local Liberian group is working with 350 children ages 1-8 at the Sports Complex. Staff members are holding a three-hour program of preschool activities, games and evangelism followed by a meal for the kids every weekday.

SIM-related churches also started a children’s feeding program at the Kendeja Culture Center for up to 100 children. Similar programs will be set up at refugee camps in Brewerville as funds become available.

Future projects include a “resettlement package” for each family head. Churches are also working together to begin work on a training project aimed at equipping the members to teach Sunday school and lead Bible studies. “We also hope to also raise funds for the school start-up project, renovations for staff housing, and a second shortwave transmitter for ELWA,” Sacra says.

All churches in the country have been affected by the fighting, he adds. “The Monrovia district was severely affected with many of the churches damaged and entire congregations. . . . Many of these people have now moved three to five times during the last four years of fighting. This chronic moving with very few possessions is terribly disruptive to the development of the kids and to the lives of the families.”

In recent developments, additional West African peacekeeping forces are expected to arrive in Liberia this weekend, Associated Press reported. Troops will go to north-central Liberia as early as Saturday, moving into the countryside for the first time to quell unrest that has forced tens of thousands of civilians to flee. Col. Theophilus Tawiah, the force’s chief of staff, urged those displaced by the war to return to refugee camps and their homes in the north, saying troops would be there soon to protect them. “We are reassuring them that we are deploying by the weekend, so they should go back to their camps,” Tawiah said. He added there would be “big trouble” if the refugees headed for Monrovia.

The arrival of the peace force on Aug. 4, followed by a peace accord Aug. 18, largely has brought calm to Liberia’s capital. It has helped end more than two months of rebel sieges of Monrovia, lifted after ex-president Charles Taylor resigned and flew into exile in Nigeria on Aug. 11. The West African peacekeeping force has reached 3,050 and is expected to expand to nearly 3,500 by Wednesday, Sept. 10. About 200 troops from Ghana were to arrive by this weekend while Benin will send 250 soldiers next week. Some 2,300 U.S. troops are stationed on warships off Monrovia. Their mission is to support the West African peacekeeping force. (SIM/HCJB World Radio/AP/Reuters)

FREE WORLD WALL MAP: Full-color, 22-inch by 34-inch world wall map. To order, e-mail your name and mailing address to or visit http://www.hcjb.org.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * James A. Ferrier HCJB World Radio U.S. Ministries Communications Director E-mail: Phone: 1-719-590-9800 Fax: 1-719-590-9801 Web: http://www.hcjb.org http://www.beyondthecall.org * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Editor’s Note. Feel free to forward this to any interested friends. Our lists are distributed for information purposes and to encourage prayer. HCJB World Radio does not necessarily endorse or support the activities on which it reports. _______________________________________________ HCJBDaily mailing list

with subscribe in the subject line.

— Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).